108 Bulletin UASVM Food Science and Technology 70(2)/2013, 108-113 ISSN-L 2344-2344; Print ISSN 2344-2344; Electronic ISSN 2344-5300 New Trend on Halva Production: Dietetic Halva and Nougat. Production Technology and Compositions Emil RACOLŢA, Vlad MUREŞAN, Livia ŢICREA Faculty of Food Science and Technology, University of Agricultural Sciences and Veterinary Medicine Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 3-5 Calea Mănăştur, 400372, Cluj-Napoca, Romania emil.racolta@usamvcluj.ro Abstract. In the last years sugar free confectionery market had grown steadily. These types of products are primarily addressed to diabetics and dieters, but the main driving factor of their growth is the increase of the obese population who raised concern about their health. Halva is known as a high caloric product with its nutritional energy higher than 500 kcal/100g, the demand of a sugar free version for this confectionery products group being those a current need. This work aimed to develop new products – dietetic halva and nougat, their production technology and compositions being in detail described. A new trend on halva production was established by developing a dietetic halva and nougat. The problem which is solved by the current work is to assure a proper technology in order to obtain a dietetic halva similar in taste and texture with the conventional one. Keywords: Dietetic halva, Dietetic nougat, Isomalt, Maltitol INTRODUCTION Nowadays, obesity and overweight are serious public health problems. In the European Union, based on the latest available data, more than half (52%) of the adult population are now overweight or obese. Moreover, on average, 17% of the adult population is obese (OECD, 2012). Across European Union, the prevalence of obesity – which presents greater health risks than overweight – ranges from 8% (Romania and Switzerland) to over 25% (Hungary, United Kingdom) (Eurostat, 2011). Consumers start to understand the message and functions of low calorie product categories which serve their demands for “healthy eating” when thinking about less calories and kind-to-the-teeth functions. Consequently, the demand for low calorie increases worldwide. Halva is an old confectionery product which derives its hard texture from a mixture of cooked sugar syrup beat with soapwort (Saponaria officinalis) root extract – nougat, and sesame or sunflower paste – tahini (Eissa and Zohair, 2006). Sunflower halva, popular in countries from Eastern Europe is made of sunflower seeds tahini, instead of sesame (Mureşan et al., 2010). As Halva has a nutritional energy higher than 500 kcal/100g, the demand of a sugar free version for this confectionery products group becomes a current need. This work aimed to develop new confectionery products – dietetic halva and nougat. The first objective was the elaboration of a new sugar free nougat technology with similar properties as the conventional one. The second objective of this work consisted on the development of a dietetic halva by replacing the conventional nougat with the sugar free one elaborated previously.